Greg Crowson of Denver cheers on Tom Danielson during Stage 1 of the USA Pro Challenge from Durango to Telluride.

TELLURIDE — Some random observations of Stage 1 of the USA Pro Challenge from Durango to Telluride:

* You can’t beat Durango for a stage start, merely because there’s no better way to start any bike race than with fresh pastry. No place I’ve tried in Colorado has pastry like the Jean Pierre Bakery on Main Avenue right near the starting line. For two days I began my day with a warmed raspberry croissant. If I hadn’t driven my own car, I would’ve thought I was in the Tour de France.

* It’s probably a good thing Paul Sherwen and Phil Liggett started their NBC broadcast after the peloton passed through Stoner, Colo. I was wondering if that’s where the peloton had their feed zone. Then again, maybe they held it a few miles up the road in Munchies, Colo.

TELLURDIE — Tyler Farrar of Team Garmin-Sharp wasn’t planning on racing in the USA Pro Challenge. He didn’t last year. The Wenatchee, Wash., native is based in Gent, Belgium, is fluent in Dutch and prefers the flatter races in Western Europe.

What do you know? He comes to the Rocky Mountains and wins the first stage Monday.

“This race wasn’t on my program at the start of the year,” he said “Just during the Tour (de France), I had a sitdown with (director of competition) Allan Peiper and we were just talking about the race program at the end of the season. He just threw it out there: ‘Do you want to do Utah and Colorado? They’re not really races for you but it might be fun.'”
It’s pronounced FAIR-aw, as in Fawcett

Tyler Farrar is one of the world’s top sprinters but no one but race announcers can pronounce his name. It’s not FAIR-er. It’s not faw-RAH. It’s pronounced FAIR-aw as in Farrah Fawcett.

The death of Belgium’s Wouter Weylandt in Monday’s Giro d’Italia hit home in Colorado. He was the best friend of Tyler Farrar, the sprinting star of Boulder-based Team Garmin-Cervelo. They trained together, and Farrar returned to their base in Belgium Tuesday.

Weylandt’s death put Garmin-Cervelo’s David Millar in the lead heading into Tuesday’s race, but it’s obvious he didn’t feel right about wearing the ceremonial pink jersey. In a statement Monday, Millar said:

“I love cycling, and I’ve always been enchanted by the epic scale of it all; it was why I fell in love with it as a boy. Yet Wouter’s death today goes beyond anything that our sport is supposed to be about; it is a tragedy that we as sportsmen never expect, yet we live with it daily, completely oblivious to the dangers we put ourselves in. This is a sad reminder to us, the racers, what risks we take and what lives we lead.

“Wouter was a sprinter; this means he was one of the most skillful bike-handlers in the peloton. For this to have happened to him shows that we are all at risk every single kilometre we race.